Undercover lottery investigation tests store clerks' honesty

"Shady appearing Gordon Medenica indicates that when lottery retailer ticket clerks/owners are given winning tickets by someone who didn't actually buy the ticket that the situation is magically transmuted to "entrapment""

That's the part that's really screwed up. Motives aside, sending out the warning should have a deterent effect by letting clerks know that the person they're trying to steal a ticket from may be a reporter who's filming them. Describing it as entrapment, OTOH, is incredibly stupid. Since the Dateline investigation was done privately and didn't have the cooperation of the lottery they had to use a real winning ticket, which they presumably got by buying all 1000 numbers for the pick 3. The ticket was only worth $500, which isn't much for tricking otherwise honest clerks into  stealing. They may have been monitoring the results, but they were basicaly doing exactly what many players do: taking their tickets to the store and trusting the clerk to check them honestly.

Remember this was a "Sting" Operation.

I agree with Tiggs on the issue if you don't know you got a winner you should not be playing!

Personally i check all my tickets here on Lottery Post. Then i go to the store and tell the clerk how much i have won. Then i also ask them for the "Players Copy" of the pay-out.

If i'm cashing in a "Scratch-off i do the same. Even if it's a loser i ask for my losing ticket back & the slip that shows it's "not a winner."

"So easy a cave man can do it."

Cutla$$Bob

These types of investigations should be done more frequently, imo.  I work in a convenience store, our lottery machine is situated to face the customers, the screen can be seen by them.  Also, when any ticket gets validated as a winner, the machine makes a sound depending on the type of winner, which can be heard clear to the back of the store.  As a rule (for myself at least), I always hand back any losing tickets to the customer....specifically because of this type of situation.  If the customer then asks me to throw them away, I rip them up before they hit the trash.  I don't understand why these clerks would do this....and think they could get away with it.  They will eventually be caught, and imo it's not worth losing my job (even if it is a min. wage job), going to jail, paying fines..etc.  Once convicted as a thief, they will have a hard time finding a job. 

I agree with many of the posters here...If you don't know how to play..then don't. Don't take up 20 min. of my time asking me how to play when there are customers behind you....especially when scratch tickets have clear instructions on how to play and win.  Details are on the front and back of each scratch ticket. How hard is it? "Scratch the play area, if you get 3 like symbols, amts, etc in a row,  you win prize shown. If you find said symbol, you get double the prize shown" Duh!  And the instructions are on the back of every Powerball play slip and actual ticket.  Please Read!  Check your tickets before you enter the store, so that you know if you have winners or not.  While I try to be fair to all of my customers and give them the time they deserve, it does get annoying when someone brings in a month's worth of saved up tickets (which they don't even know if they are winners or not), and asks me to check them all when I've got a line of customers backing up. It's not fair to those other customers to have to wait for me to scan tickets when the majority of them are losing tickets.  Especially with scratch tickets, check to be sure they are winners because in our state, the lottery machine will lock us out if we scan too many non-winning scratch tickets in a row.

As other people have said here, don't trust any clerk with your tickets. Know what you have before you enter the store, stay at the counter while the clerk is validating your tickets.  Stores are only allowed to pay out up to a certain amount, as per the Lottery commission in each state, which normally the max amount is like $500.  Anything over that has to be paid out by the Lottery Commission.  Just be alert when cashing in, don't just blindly hand a clerk your tickets.

tiggs went in a store yesterday with a 100.00 cash 3 ticket and the clerk asked if tiggs wanted it checked..tiggs said no and he handed it to her to cash it and said it was worth 100.00...If you don't know that you have a winner and know how much that winner is worth..DON'T BUY BANY LOTTERY TICKETS!!!...Can you dig it?..

Since the Dateline investigation was done privately and didn't have the cooperation of the lottery they had to use a real winning ticket, which they presumably got by buying all 1000 numbers for the pick 3.

You bring up an interesting point, I wonder if they actually played all 1000 combinations or used a winning lottery system to buy their winning tickets.  Maybe that's a story for another Dateline investigation, "Winning lottery systems, do they exist?".

hehe nah, they spent $3000 playing a system to get that winning ticket

I see it's another open season for immigrants.  In this very website

I have seen Johnsons and Smiths arrested for swindling people off of their

lottery wins but nah, those do not inspire such passions as "Sahib" eh? ;-)

I see it's another open season for immigrants.  In this very website

I have seen Johnsons and Smiths arrested for swindling people off of their

lottery wins but nah, those do not inspire such passions as "Sahib" eh? ;-)